Starting a blog is easy, and required a small financial investment (there aren’t any businesses in the world that required a so small investment upfront) and your time. If you are ok with that, this post is for you.

In this article, I’m going to share step by step how to start your personal website from scratch without the need to know about graphic design, complicated program language or spending thousand of dollars in development.

People think starting a website is hard work and need lot of knowledge. They little know nowadays thanks to WordPress and other website platforms anyone can have a website running in no time.

If I show you how to setup your website in less than ten minutes, would you start today? If YES, carry on reading.

The Journey To My First Blog/Website

Here’s my journey to help you understand what it takes to start a blog/website and how to get in the fast-track to the blogging world.

Back in July of 2011 while working as a chef, I started a blog to share my travel experience and with the hope to make some extra besides my salary.

I didn’t have much of direction back then and know a clear idea how to make it work. I was so confused. Took 3 months only to have my domain registered and registered with a hosting company.

I’ve been blogging for 5 years now, built few websites, gone through errors and trials, but the overwhelming support of the blogging community have pushed me to continue this incredible journey.

I want to help you to get started forward this beautiful journey, see you grow and spread your message on the web.

I also want to help you avoid all the expensive mistakes that most people do.

My first mistake

The first month I signed up with a free service called Wix.com and started to use their simple tutorial to make the frame of the website. I spent 2 months on it when I discovered that I didn’t own the domain, in fact the domain name will almost always be an “extra” extension to the service provider’s domain.

Not only that but the customization options for design, functionality and revenue were limited, and because I was on someone else ‘s platform, my new business would be subject to their changes of policies.

Not an excellent start, but finally after 3 months, I decide to buy my domain name and to use a reliable web hosting company.

How To Start Your Blog/Website Today

Step 1; Choose Your Niche With Love

Planning is necessary to be successful with your blog. Spend some time thinking about:

Your passion; It’s easier to write and go throughout out the first few months of blogging if you are passionate about the topic.

What do you bring to the table; Your skills and experiences which you can share with others.

Who You Can Help; Blogging isn’t about you, but about help others. Did you recently help someone or some business and got paid for it?

Step 2; Finding a Domain Name And Web Hosting Provider

Now that you’ve got a better idea about the topic of your blog, it’s time to figure out the domain name.

Domain name – This will be your personal blog address where people find you over and over again. Try to keep it simple and to the point. Keep in mind, the easier people can remember, the better for your branding.

If you were born in Russia, and you want to call your blog with your name “Ivan Volkovich Rozhdestvenskij” –> www.IvanVolkovichRozhdestvenskij.com, don’t be surprised if people can’t find you or your beautiful blog.

You can search the domain directly on Inmotion Hosting during the registration process, your first domain name is FREE (The cost of a domain name is usually $10/year).

Web hosting – This will be the home of your blog address and content that’s on the blog. Think of it as a computer hard drive that stores all your content on your blog (images, blog posts and so on).

I use and trust InMotion Hosting since the beginning because they are reliable, I love their customer support and great value for money.

There are so many horror stories around the net from bloggers going nuts with their hosting company. Fortunately, I never had an issue with InMotion Hosting. Everything just works giving me peace of mind.

I am not savvy with all these web hosting stuff but setting up with InMotion is really easy. Whenever I set up a new blog, in less than 10 minutes the job is done and ready for my first blog. So far, I have had a wonderful experience with it.

So, why use InMotion for your web hosting?

As I said is super easy to set up without any technical knowledge, but there is much more as their packages offer:

Easy Installation; Get WordPress, Joomla, or PrestaShop installed for you during checkout (I use WordPress).

FREE 24 hours chat support; I never wait for more than 2 minutes to get someone to assist me (Very Important!; websites like GoDaddy offer only phone support which will cost you a fortune and usually takes more than 10 minutes to get hold of someone.

Step 3; Choose Your Hosting Plan

When you go to the InMotion site, you will see three options.

For those who are just starting their own blog, I recommend the “Launch” plan for now – you can always upgrade later if you decide you want more advanced features, but you get more than enough with the Launch.

You can follow the steps below:

Choosing A Domain Name

Next you’ll be asked about a domain name. You can search for and choose a domain name right there, or you can say that you already have a domain name.

B) Near the end of the form, you’ll be given the option to automatically install WordPress, PrestaShop, Joomla, or No Thanks and the Domain Privacy.

I chose No Thanks in my setup because I wanted to see everything available before doing an install. I like to keep my info private on the internet so I add the Domain Privacy too.

All in all, it took about 15 minutes to set up my account, and most of that was thinking about what I really wanted.

You’ll receive an email with your log in instructions.

Step 4; Install WordPress

The famous one-minute WordPress installation and you are set with your first website.

The easiest way to install WordPress with the InMotion is:

Once you received a welcome email from InMotion, click on it and it will lead you to the Account Management Panel.

Click the Install Popular Software link.

Click on Install WordPress and you’ll be asked to log in with your cPanel username and password. NOTE: your password is the same as the one for the Account Management Panel.

Click the blue button Install. Once you log in you’ll see a form asking for some information for your WordPress install. It’ll look like this:

Here are some important bits about this form:

Change the default database prefix. I usually remove it completely.

Database name; your domain name.

You must put in a Site Name and Site Description. The normal WordPress install process doesn’t require these, but this wizard does. If you want one blank then you can go back into WordPress after it’s installed and adjust things.

Under Advanced Option, make sure Auto Upgrade is checked. This allows WordPress to update itself in the event of a security problem. It’s VERY important.

Before you click Install, put your email address into the “Email installation details to:” box. If anything goes wrong you’ll be able to give it to InMotion for analysis.

Lastly, click Install and you are ready. (That was easy, right?)

Happy blogging!

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